[Effect of Fuzheng Huayu capsule on serum metabolomics in rats with liver fibrosis induced by dimethylnitrosamine].

To investigate the effect of Fuzheng Huayu capsule(FHC) on serum metabolomics in rats with liver fibrosis induced by dimethylnitrosamine(DMN). The metabolic profiles of rat serum of normal group, model group, and FHC group were established by liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry technology. Furthermore, the levels of endogenous metabolites such as amino acids and bile acids were measured in each group. The results showed that there were significant differences in the serum metabolic fingerprints between the FHC group and the model group. Moreover, 5 potential lysophosphatidylcholines biomarkers were identified by using principal component analysis(PCA) and partial least squares discriminant analysis (PLS-DA). Quantitative analysis of amino acids and bile acids in serum of rats showed that 14 kinds of amino acids and 5 kinds of bile acids returned to normal levels after four weeks of FHC treatment. In conclusion, the anti-hepatic fibrosis mechanisms of FHC may be related to the metabolic process of lysophosphatidylcholines, amino acids and bile acids.

Serum Metabolomics Analysis Reveals a Distinct Metabolic Profile of Patients with Primary Biliary Cholangitis.

Primary biliary cholangitis (PBC) is a chronic autoimmune liver disease associated with profound metabolic changes. The purpose of this study was to identify a distinctive metabolic signature from the training set with 29 PBC patients, 30 hepatitis B virus (HBV)-caused cirrhosis (HBC) and 41 healthy controls, and to validate the applicability and stability of the distinctive model from the validation set with 21 PBC patients, 7 autoimmune hepatitis (AIH) and 9 HBC. The sera were investigated using high resolution nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and the datasets were analyzed pairwise using pattern recognition methods. 45 distinguishable metabolites were identified and 15 metabolic pathways were reprogrammed. The altered metabolic pathways were associated with glucose, fatty acid and amino acid metabolites. Logistic regression and ROC analysis were used to establish a diagnostic model with the equated (p) = -12.22-3.46*log(4-hydroxyproline) + 6.62*log(3-hydroxyisovalerate) - 2.44*log(citraconate) - 3.80*log(pyruvate). The area under the curve (AUC) of the optimized model was 0.937 (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.868-0.976) in the training set and 0.890 (95% CI: 0.743-0.969) in the validation set. These results not only revealed the potential pathogenesis of PBC, but also provided a feasible diagnostic tool for PBC populations through detection of serum metabolites.